The Cause of Thunder
by margotsmissingfinger
Summary: See Jane's big brain go in circles. See Jane run.
1. Chapter 1

Jane slung her pack over her shoulder and set out across the desert floor, the harness within clinking gently as she made her way through the scrub brush.

She was in the habit of opening the cargo gate as soon as the sun went down to let in air and reveal the fading wash of sunset. The rapid plummet in temperature helped to reduce the strain on the climate control, which during the day fought against the brutal heat without and the overwrought circuit boards within. On nights when the moon was rising late or still a discreet sliver and when Darcy and Erik were absent, out living their lives, it also lured her outdoors to clear her head.

To the northwest of their anonymous little compound ran an enormous electric transmission line (from where to where?) and less than half a mile away rose a solitary, imposing iron giant, hoisting the lines across across the valley and out of sight. It was the only visible indication of civilization apart from their dusty and humble research facility. In the last eight months or so, she'd become well acquainted with it.

She'd stood staring up after Thor until her neck had cramped, and then gotten to work. In daylight, the damage to the town had been unforgiving. It wasn't safe or ethical to continue her research so close to civilians, so she regretfully said goodbye to her charming midcentury car dealership and moved them to even more remote digs.

What agents had packed up in an afternoon had taken a month to unpack and rewire, but even so, it hadn't taken long to fully understand the obstacles she faced and the time required.

Needing air badly, it had driven her outside and there, as if manifest, stood the tower. It was almost heavy-handed.

Restless and frustrated, she'd collected rubberized work gloves, boots and a climbing harness, normally used for satellite receiver maintenance, and begun the slow ascent. Moving her safety line with the gloves proved painstaking, but similar to pipetting samples during her undergrad studies, the methodical and rhythmic movement absorbed her thoughts. Hardly knowing how she'd gotten there, she would reach the split of the two catenary arms, some three hundred feet in the air, suspended in the crux of a giant slingshot.

The overbearing buzzing of the lines swept the last cobwebs away and with her troubles on the ground she could always see them better. Not to mention the sky, it was almost like being wrapped up in stars.

It was easy to feel small, but only because it made you a vessel for its wonder.

That was something she thought about incessantly too, whatever had such a being seen in her? How could she possibly contain the depths required to transfix someone from another world? What on earth had resonated in him?

Besides an unfortunate, natural (god-given?) talent for puns, she didn't think badly of herself. As a female astrophysicist, she'd learned to demand respect and she had no reservations when it came to a level of competition for funding and grants that could be accurately described as a bloodbath. Anyone who accused her of being a workaholic was likely jealous. Anyone who was jealous was likely a guy. Any guy would be lucky to hold her attention.

But guy didn't quite cover it here, did it?

There was never enough data.

Which was to say, it remained a mystery and if mysteries didn't drive her up a wall she'd have become an accountant or a poet or _anything_ but a scientist; truth-seeking was a callous and punishing mistress.

If she had ever talked about it directly with Darcy and Erik, she would have been forced to acknowledge that she was motivated by obsession. Those blue eyes had hit her like a hammer striking a tuning fork and for all the time that had lapsed she was still quivering. Still at a complete loss to understand her own heart.

Let alone anyone else's heart, mortal or otherwise.

And if she had ever talked about it directly, she might have also acknowledged that she had been thoroughly stood up, and that _it was not something she took kindly to_. There were myriad possibilities, legitimate or otherwise to excuse his absence, but a deal had been struck of his own proposing, so why exactly was she the one breaking her back to fulfill the main clause?

So her crusade had slipped down a greased half-pipe just a few months in, when, at the same time, both the realization that she would be old and grey indeed had begun to sting and the suited shadows had taken the trouble to have their offers rejected in person, again.

If Thor had anything going in his favor, it was that she took far less kindly to _them_. They were also used to getting their way and while patriotism was all very nice, it was naïve to be blindly dependent on a shadow that would undoubtedly ask for things in return. And Jane knew too well that there was nothing to hold them accountable. Without an enforcer, what even held them to their bargain?

So she fully intended to say no as often as she could for as long as she could. She'd worked very hard to win enough funding to achieve what independence she had and she wasn't eager to be responsible for any weaponized advancements.

Several months passed without a ripple, but they could afford to bide their time. In the end, they'd get what they wanted. For now, she had balked and kicked up so much dust that they'd decided it was more productive to leave her to her own devices.

For now, she smoldered. She could have packed up and taken tenure track anywhere (with a bouncer virtually turning eager post-docs away at the door,) could have had a husband and children, (that is, if she ever made up her mind about it,) and just maybe a Nobel prize, (forty years out, of course.) Instead, she had a skeletal transmission tower and a string tied beneath her ribs that refused to snap, however hard she pulled.

Securing her harness, then double checking, she slowly let the line take her weight, straightening her legs against the tower at the same time. The breeze swayed her lightly and she tilted back to let the sky fill her field of vision. She could almost imagine she was an astronaut on a space walk, floating, at peace. At least, if she ignored the cables, aviation obstacle light, and the wisps of loosened hair drifting over her face.

As a child she'd wanted more than anything to go to space. As a teenager she'd read _Solaris_, devouring even the dry textbook chapters, fascinated in tandem by the portrayal of the human interior as unknowable and alien and by the rebuke of expecting extraterrestrial life to arrive in humanoid form.

When sleep deprived, (which she avoided from experience; she'd become a firm believer in polyphasic naps while preparing for the defense of her dissertation,) this was the statistical improbability that usually set her off: humanoid extraterrestrial life. It was positively asinine, yet on at least one vividly memorable occasion, while sleeping over at a friend's as a bleeding-heart teenager, she'd vented her frustration with the shortage of worthwhile boys in their year, wishing in her jaded youth that, 'prince charming would just fall out of the sky already.'

She knew—_knew_ that the human brain was wired to seek the circumstantial, the soft, the coincidental, the anecdotal evidence, but it was the sort of thing that gave even a person who was a professional skeptic pause.

Especially if said professional skeptic had been programing for so many hours that her thirty day leave-in contacts had dried out.

So she valued Darcy and Erik's company all the more, because if there was a fast track for mad scientist, she was leaving a trail of sonic booms in her wake. Although she was known to fall asleep at the keyboard, she tried to get at least six hours every night, whether in nap cycles or straight through. Less than that and she started making mistakes in her coding that were painfully time-consuming to catch and correct. Less than that and she tended to disintegrate into dry, frightening giggles.

So much of their programing had to be written from scratch, Einstein and Rosen's bridge had only been theoretical material, up until now. But fortunately, Jane had had the privilege of watching Darcy come into her own, discovering a love of hacking and programing. Just as importantly, by being herself, Darcy gave Jane permission to uncoil and enjoy herself. They now had a weekly movie night and although Jane pretended to suffer through Darcy's rom com picks, she'd secretly loved every cheesy, wonderful minute of _Moonstruck_, awful saxophones and all. Jane was deeply grateful for their bromance.

Their best nights were when they ran a test without a hitch. The three of them gathered together around the monitor of Jane's patent-pending 'Franken-machine,' talking and listening to music or a game while watching the script feed for errors. Darcy always produced a six pack to celebrate as the completion percentage climbed higher without issue.

The first sip of beer was always deeply satisfying, although as they came closer and closer to a clean finish, Jane was always too anxious to finish hers. Whatever the outcome, someone needed to be sober to get them to the nearest twenty-four hour diner when it was all over, and often as not, it was Jane. The long drives to town cleared her head too, and those greasy meals and long, rambling conversations, serious and silly, meant the world to her. It was while clutching a warming half-full beer, she felt all the thrill that had lured her into the tedious racket of truth-seeking in the first place and knew without doubt that she couldn't imagine doing anything else.

Glancing at the illuminated face of her watch, Jane decided she'd take a long (for the desert) shower and pack it in for the night. She would have a quiet, productive morning and then take some time to relax when Darcy got back in the afternoon. Catching her footing again on the railing, she stepped up to unhook her safety and lower it.

She smelled the smoke first.


	2. Chapter 2

It took several minutes to register and then she froze, already certain of what she would see when she turned to look over her shoulder, at first only struck by the thought that villagers with pitchforks had come to call. The next thought was that it was either fortunate or telling that she'd been the only one home. After that, sheer vulnerability. Did she dare come down? Did she dare stay put? Her heart competed with the volume of the droning cables overhead.

Were they searching for her now in the brush? How long would it be before they thought to look up? To keep her eyes adapted to the dark she didn't look at the fire, instead looking below her into the inky void, the nothing that prevented her from being afraid of the enormous height.

_Who, who, who?_ Was it a message for her? S.H.I.E.L.D.'s way of not taking no for an answer? Or was she supposed to be down there, burning at the stake?

She could either risk them having night field equipment on the ground or wait for someone to climb up after her. Running rapid pros and cons, she decided if someone was out to get her, they'd have to come and get her. So with silent care, she re-ascended the fifty feet that she'd come down and waited out a long, long night.

It was very cold when the first grey light spread over the landscape. Exhaustion had overpowered her terror and she had nodded off for a while, she couldn't be sure how long. Her hiking jacket had kept her from freezing, but her fingers were stiff inside the rubber-coated work gloves, her throat dry and constricted with fear.

An unusual layer of cloud shrouded the nascent sunrise, washing the sky red. Working feeling back into her hands, she carefully removed her cell phone from her pocket. She'd turned it off hours ago, afraid of broadcasting her location, but wanting desperately to warn Darce and Erik. Now she hesitated still, searching for any sign of activity.

The lab had been little more than a corrugated barn with a heavy-weight climate control system, now it was a smoking, blackened frame. Had the small safe where she kept her backups survived without baking it's contents? It was still difficult to see in the grey predawn light.

Cursing silently, she turned on her phone and called Darcy, hands unsteady. If anything had happened to her overnight, she'd never forgive herself. Erik was on the other side of the world wrapping up some of his research and she could only hope that he was safely out of range.

It rang and rang and then, "Hey! This is Darcy. Send me a text!" Then, "This mail box is full. Goodbye."

It was startlingly mundane. Darcy never did answer her phone, and for the first time Jane wondered if there had been any faulty wiring in her equipment. Maybe she'd just scared the shit out of herself over a straight-forward accident. Maybe she'd slept dangling from a high voltage transmission tower for no reason at all. Maybe.

Either way, her lab had burnt to the ground. That was bad enough that maybe an unknown threat was just the distraction she needed. She couldn't stay up on the tower forever. She left Erik a voicemail detailing her situation and hoped she wouldn't be the death of him. Then she descended.

The sky was very strange as the sun rose under cloud cover, shining like a dirty quarter and evoking the old proverb about sailors taking warning. If she hadn't been so focused on scanning the area for any movement, she might have realized how freakish the gathering storm was for the time of year.

When her feet touched the ground, she considered dropping into a marine's belly crawl, but when nothing terrible sprung out at her, she considered the snakes and scorpions who were her neighbors.

A low crouch would have to do.

The thing about the desert was that it was deathly, impossibly quiet. There was only wind to keep you company and without that was complete silence. It could be startling, but it hadn't ever bothered Jane until now. Now her heart beat seemed truly audible and just as liable to give her away as her footfalls.

She made her way to a small ridge between the lab and the dirt access road and lay low to compose herself and decide what to do.

There was a funny taste in her mouth. The thirty yards distance to the road seemed insurmountable. She could walk to town, but it would take hours and when the sun emerged heat stroke would become a serious danger.

She wavered, then convulsed as a cloud of dust approached: a vehicle. As it got closer, it slowed, as the driver noticed the smoking ruins, and then floored it, jerking to a halt with a spray of sandy dirt. It was Darcy. Jane sagged with relief as she jumped out of the van.

"JANE!"

Instantly Jane was on her feet, but her reply died on her lips as something rose from the ashes and began to walk—no, walking wasn't the right description—something began to _move_ towards Darcy.

There was a fierce, almost metallic taste in Jane's sinuses and the back of her mouth, like ozone, almost as if she were going to sneeze, and her pounding heart had sped up so fast that it droned like the high voltage cables and Jane wondered if she was about to faint because her ears seemed to have closed up, but she had to protect Darcy—how? _somehow_—from whatever that nightmare was and she dizzily stumbled forward as she ripped lightning down from the sky and incinerated it.

The heavens boomed in approval as she gasped in for breath as her eyes found Darcy's. At some point, Jane had fallen to her knees and she realized that her hands were shaking.

She also realized that there was absolutely nothing humanoid about the crumpled, lifeless form within the lightning strike.

Darcy's jaw was slack when she finally looked back to Jane.

"That was you, wasn't it?"

Jane felt herself nod.

"Cowabunga," Darcy whispered. "Holy shit, do you think you could do it again?"

Jane felt herself nod again. The funny part was that she was sure that it had been her who called the lightning down and she was sure that she could do it again.

She took a deep breath, ozone flooded her nose and a jagged streak kissed a lightning rod on the tower and seethed down into the earth. It felt like being hit between the shoulder blades, like having the wind knocked out of her, but it didn't particularly hurt.

Her hands absolutely shook now.

"Maybe you picked it up off Thor, like magnets charging."

Jane let out a choked laugh, "Physics." She gasped to catch her breath, adding, "Or you mean, we had great chemistry?"

Darcy cringed and groaned, "Hey Zeus, woman. You really are unstoppable." She paused, staring at Jane with a different sort of amazement, the sort of amazement people reserved for double downs and airbrush wizard vans.

"At least I know it's really you and not something zipped up in a Jane suit."

"You know, you don't seem too worried about that, honestly."

"Uh, because you look absolutely terrified? You're shaking like a leaf, Jane. Do you think Ironman and who'shisface were afraid of their own superpowers? This is awesome!"

She shook her head now.

"Is it? We need to get out of here Darcy. We're lucky—lucky that _that_ was combustible."

She couldn't bring herself to look at it. A strange, completely new life form and for the first time she could remember the force of curiosity that had propelled all of her decisions her entire life was utterly absent.


	3. Chapter 3

It began to rain.

It didn't rain in summer. The water washed over the windshield and as Darcy switched on the wipers, Jane thought to herself that now would be an excellent time for Thor to fall out of the sky. She could hit him with the van again, which would let out all of her hurt and anger right away and then she'd be free to just be relieved and happy to see him. It'd be perfect.

The wiper blades swished. It rained harder.

* * *

She'd ordered Darcy stay behind her as she shifted an I-beam away from the safe door enough to open it. The combination had taken her several attempts before she could control her trembling.

The hard drives inside looked intact, but it wasn't possible to tell yet. In fact, her heart actually sunk at finding them. If they'd been stolen she'd have a clear motive for a human antagonist.

S.H.I.E.L.D. had never looked so good.

* * *

Darcy didn't have to be told to floor it. Jane's hands continued to shake as she pulled up Coulson's direct line. As the call connected to one of her satellites to facilitate the remote access and directed the call, she covered a lot of mental ground.

When had it happened? That first storm? Or the second? He'd been Hades, fallen and vulnerable, and she'd been overwhelmed by sympathy for the devil?

She was crossing her mythologies now; Coulson had better answer promptly.

Or had it been sealed in her impetuous kiss? Wasn't that always how these things worked? Kisses signified all manner of things, love, forgiveness, promises, betrayal.

"Dr. Foster? What—"

At least she didn't have to _act_ flustered and terrified.

"Something burned my lab down last night while I was out, and Thor fried it this morning when it—uh, tried to put the moves on Darcy and I."

She could _feel_ Darcy rolling her eyes.

"He's not here," a sharp, bitter laugh burst from her like a gun shot, "but it was a lightning strike. I mean, who else?"

Now Darcy was simply staring at her and she grabbed the wheel, forcing them back onto the dirt road that was rapidly becoming mud.

"I don't know. Definitely not from around here. We didn't stick around to find out. Roger, yes, thank you."

She hung up and exhaled.

"Thor?" Darcy asked.

"I love science, but I'm not volunteering to have electrodes stuck to me, Darcy," she whispered.

"Ok, I can get that." Darcy swallowed, turning back to driving.

"Although maybe we've just found our answer to the arc reactor cap limit."

She looked straight ahead, refusing to meet Darcy's eyes.

* * *

While Darcy filled the tank with gas, the axis of Jane's thoughts began to wobble.

There had also been five thousand dollars cash inside the safe and suddenly the cartel wars seemed, well, still horrifying, but slightly less terrifying.

Her Spanish was pretty miserable, but if she could get to an airport?

"Earth to Jane? You wanna slurpee? You look like you could use a slurpee. You know, don't answer. You definitely need a slurpee...gotta get some sugar into her before she goes into shock," Darcy muttered to herself as she turned towards the convenience mart.

Jane waited until she was through the automatic doors and slid into the driver's seat.


	4. Chapter 4

Thank you, dear Readers, for you patience.

* * *

Two miles out, Jane put the clutch in park and her head against the wheel. A fresh sheet of rain swept over the hood as she took a deep breath and struggled to suppress her _Thelma & Louise_ instinct. (Another movie night.)

Bottom line, if she ran, they'd want to know why.

And maybe the only thing she could hope to control was _which_ questions they asked.

Surely being less logical was an easier way to live. Surely.

* * *

Darcy was sitting on the curb, double-fisting two plastic cups that Bloomberg could have worn as hats when she pulled up.

"I'm sorry!"

"What the _fuck_ was that?" Darcy whispered furiously. Her mouth was a violent blue.

Jane shook her head, caught somewhere between laughing and crying.

"I'm driving. Drink this."

Jane tore into the potato chips instead.

* * *

She bargained with herself as they hurtled towards the nearest base.

"Jane," Darcy said warningly, "you've been silent for the last twenty miles. If you're planning something, I need to know before you go bolting for the border again."

"I'm just wishing we had more chips, I swear."

Darcy snorted.

"Right, but seriously, you get anymore lightning scrambled ideas like that, you need to tell me. _Someone's gotta stop you_," she finished muttering half under her breath.

"It's a big goddamn secret to keep, Darcy, and it's not about trust. Getting secrets out of people is their whole reason for being."

"Jane, even they wouldn't imagine that it was you. They'll probably just stick us in a silo somewhere with a bunch of shiny new toys to keep you happy."

Jane realized that she was pulling on the neck of her t-shirt as if it had tried to strangle her and put her hand back in her lap.

"Okay." She took a deep breath. "We're still going to have to pull a fast one on them. We need them to believe we can do this using arc reactors, which means fooling Tony Stark, too and frankly, our odds are shit."

"What do you mean, fool—wait, you're talking about powering this with lightning? Jane, even I understand what kind of wattage we're talking about here."

"Then you understand that short of discovering an convenient extension cord dangling from the sun, nothing else is going to run it. I'll have to fake a break through and then we'll have to be ready to _move_ so they don't have time to catch up."

"Hang on, how are you going to keep the current stable? More importantly, what if it _fries_ you in the process?"

"It won't."

"You're _not_ yourself. The Dr. Foster I know eats and breathes empirical evidence."

This rang true, but presumably she'd have a lot of time in a bunker to consider it more carefully soon enough.

"Alright, pull over and get me the cables for the oscilloscope. Coulson's probably already panicked and dispatched a detail to fetch us."

* * *

This time when it knocked her between the shoulder blades she only staggered. As she caught her balance, she caught her grasp on the strikes, flickering beyond human perception, discovering that it was no more difficult than regaining and regulating the breath that had been forced from her lungs. Straightening as she asserted her control, a wild and joyous pride suffused her, the battle hymn of a valkyrie.

Then the oscilloscope blew.

And with it her data, of course.


End file.
